Bondage and Disability: Working Around Different Abilities in Play

As I'm always fond of saying, BDSM has risks. To be fair, even non-kinky sex has risks! A team of researchers at St. George's University of London found that 0.2% of their total sudden heart attacks happened during sex. Remember, sex is a cardiovascular activity!

Those risks may be higher if you're someone with a disability. For example, being bound makes it extremely difficult to get at an inhaler in an emergency. A circulatory disorder can make it more dangerous to play with tight ties for long periods of time. Partial paralysis can mean accidentally going beyond your body's limits because of the lack of tactile feedback from your body.

But this doesn't mean that BDSM is off the table for disabled folks. It just means that you need to plan ahead, communicate more clearly and often, use your accessibility aids, and progress slowly.

Luckily for all of us, all BDSM centers those tenets, regardless of your mental or physical state. You just might need to have a heavier focus on them if you're disabled. The below tips can help you focus in on the aspects that are likely to be more impactful for you during play.

Negotiate thoroughly before play

Negotiation is important for all BDSM scenes, but it becomes even more important when there are known health issues. Make sure you and your scene partner have thoroughly discussed what needs to happen if an emergency related to your disabilities happens before, during, or after play.

This may look like:

• Knowing what to do in case of a epileptic episode or panic attack.
• Keeping medicine nearby in case of low blood sugar, allergic reactions, or asthmatic episodes.
• Progressing specific activities very slowly to reduce the likelihood of unexpected surprises.
• Sharing emergency contact numbers in case a third party is needed.
• Knowing where your local ER is, and ensuring you have the right equipment (like a wheelchair) to get someone safely transported.
• Planning for breaks mid-play to stay hydrated to rest the body.
• Disclosing any pertinent aftercare information that can help both of your recover from your scene.

Remember: if you don't experience everyday life with a disability, it can be hard to understand why you need to adjust the way you play. An activity that was a-okay two weeks ago may not be a good idea today for myriad reasons, and that's alright! Always listen to each other attentively and without judgement or too many questions. You can always plan to enjoy those activities again in the future!

Discuss everyone's needs and desires beforehand

The quickest way to ensure everyone has a great time is to talk about everyone's needs ahead of time. Everyone, regardless of their body or brain, has things that would make a scene better or worse. Knowing exactly what those things are can help you both plan something that will feel fulfilling to everyone involved.

I especially recommend talking about how you both want to feel during the scene. Often, when planning play, we tend to focus on activities. While there's nothing wrong with focusing on the specific activities you want to do, shifting the focus to how you want to feel during your play can actually be vital information when you might need to modify what you're doing.

Think about this. If you both agreed to the activity of "spanking." a Top might feel pressured to use a St. Andrew's Cross or handle a paddle that's uncomfortable for them to hold. If you both talk about it ahead of time and discover what the Bottom actually wants is to feel "used" and they think a spanking will help bring that out, the Top can use even more tools in their toolbox. They may use their hand instead of a paddle. They might add a lot of dirty talk to set the scene in a way that makes the resulting play even hotter than if they'd simply spanked a butt with a paddle that was difficult for them to hold.

Rethink the idea that sex is a spontaneous thing

Most people who live with a disability know that planning is the key to making life run smoothly. Knowing if your destination has steps, if they have food you can eat, if you can easily escape if you have a panic attack, if they have chairs you'll fit in, or if the space is too loud for you to hear well can make or break your experience with leaving the house.

Taking this same methodological planning approach with your kink play can be really helpful too. But this often means your play can just spontaneously happen. After all, needing to have specific gear and props makes it hard to randomly decide to do bondage inside of your car at 2PM on a Tuesday.

This isn't a bad thing! While TVs and movies tend to portray spontaneous sex as the hottest, or even only way to experience one another, that simply isn't the case.

Virtually everything about good sex requires some level of planning. Lube? Safer sex? Knowing what your partner likes or enjoys? All of that requires a bit (or a lot!) of forethought that isn't shown in those sex scene clips that interrupt the plot of your movie. That forethought, however, tends to make sex and play more enjoyable, and it removes the chance for potentially life-altering consequences.

Use props and sex toy as needed

When all of our "role models" for kink are based in porn, it can be hard to think up your own modifications for activities, but I promise they're out there! Don't be afraid to change up how an activity is done to make sure it's going to be more enjoyable for everyone involved. If something as simple as adding a chair can make the difference between a stressful experience and a good one, why not use the chair?

For example, a Top can sit in a chair to dole out a flogging, or a Bottom with partial paralysis can enjoy that flogging while laying down on a sex chaise or other sex furniture instead of standing at a St. Andrew's Cross.

Other examples of simple props you can use for kink scenes include:

• A chair for someone to sit in.
• A bed or massage table to lay on.
• Grips/textured pads to wrap around the handle of impact toys to make them easier to hold.
• A pillow, or pillows, that can be placed underneath the body to add support and increase comfort.
• Wearing multiple layers of clothing/fabric on areas that may be bound to reduce compression on the skin.
• A heat pack that can be placed on any parts of the body that are in pain.
• A skin-safe marker to draw on the body as a visual reminder where not to touch someone.
• A waterproof sex blanket like the Throw can become an incontinence solution for couples worried about messes during sex that may have otherwise gone into disposable absorbent briefs.

Sometimes, these props and modifications can even make the scene hotter! For example, if someone has a difficult time balancing, you may choose to bend them over a BDSM cage, allowing them to rest their upper body on top of the cage. This provides a stable balance point for them while simultaneously making them look and touch a cage the entire time you're playing. Kinky. ;)

Since a lot of people like to mix their bondage and sex, I feel like it's worth remembering that sex toys are accessibility props in their own way. Instead of moving your finger back and forth, a vibrator can buzz your body at human-incapable speeds. Instead of sliding a dildo in and out, a thrusting dildo can do all of the movement for you. If using your hands isn't always an option, a hands-free sex toy or saddle vibrator can take hands entirely out of the equation.

Sex toys can become BFFs for stimulation. Not only do they feel great, but they can take some of the manual movements and labor out of sexual pleasure, allowing you both to luxuriate in the sensations without feeling the strain.

Get comfortable with accessibility aids

If it's comfortable for the disabled partner, you may both benefit from familiarity with the disabled partner's accessibility aids. Not only can this reduce the reliance on an attendant or nurse, but it can also feel intimate to have a better understanding of your partner's experience and life.

This may not be a comfortable option for casual play, but if you're looking at lots of play sessions down the line, the two of you may want to stop and discuss the accessibility aids that may make frequent appearances during scenes or sex. If possible, set aside a laid-back, non-play-oriented time to explain how to use these aids, and get practice using these aids with the disabled partner. Having in-depth knowledge of necessary accessibility aids can make it easier to work together when you're both turned on and a bit more …distracted.

Accessibility aids may look like:

• Canes
• Shower chairs
• Overhead ceiling lifts
• Bidets
• Platform lifts
• Wheelchairs
• Hands-free bottles or other drink or food aids
• Assistance dogs or animals
• Grip aids for holding toys

You may also want to discuss how some of your frequently-used adult items are organized and stored in each place you'll frequently play together. Keeping your lube, condoms, or kink gear in easily-accessible, familiar places can make it easier for someone to find those items. In fact, especially for the vision impaired, they might be relying on it!

Explore different bondage methods

Be open-minded about how, exactly, you go about making bondage happen with disabled partners. There are hundreds of ways to bind someone, and some methods may be more accessible to some people than others.

For example, the small diameter of rope may press into skin in an uncomfortable manner, but that same person may find that they're completely okay with using cuffs because it spreads the pressure over a larger surface area. Bondage tape's unbreathable material can cause moisture build-up that might irritate someone's skin, but that same person may be a-okay using satin sashes because the material is more breathable.

Even the rope itself can make a huge difference. A 20-foot piece of rope will handle differently than a 60-foot piece of rope. Selecting shorter rope lengths can make rope handling more accessible to some Tops, especially if there's any chest or shoulder limitations in play.

You may also find that comfortable bondage methods can be location and position dependent. Someone may be okay with bondage tape while standing, but sitting or laying may make the tape uncomfortable. Someone may be alright with cuffs while laying on a Liberator sex furniture shape, but they may not be okay with cuffs on a St. Andrew's Cross where they' may be're placing more weight on their limbs.

Try to be open to all kinds of options and experimentation. If your first bondage method isn't a good fit, and everyone's open to it, simply try a different one! There are hundreds of different ways to recreate the snug feeling of restraint, so don't get caught up in a single, specific method.

Go Slow!

While I recommend taking your time with anything sexual (it tends to feel better when you're not in a rush!), taking things slow can be especially important when there are health concerns or injuries in the equation.

Instead of jumping straight into a four-limb, Spread-Eagle position, for example, consider just restraining one wrist for a bit while you enjoy foreplay. Check in on how the bound person's body feels about the restraint after five or 10 minutes. If it's positive, consider adding another wrist or ankle into the equation.

Going slowly allows you both to take the time each of you needs to check in with your bodies and determine what is or isn't working. Plus, it's much less frustrating than spending 30 minutes getting into an intricate bondage position only to find out a few minutes later that it's causing the bad kind of discomfort.

The act of bondage isn't going anywhere. Instead of being in a rush to try the most intricate, elaborate bondage set-ups you can do, start off slow. Remember that you can always add more elaborate details as you go or try something during future play sessions.

If you need another reason to be patient, think about how you want to keep surprises ready to explore in the future. If you use all of your cool surprises now, you'll have to brainstorm all new ones!

Finally, Keep an Open Mind

A disability doesn't mean that your favorite bondage positions or kinks have to be off the table. It just requires some conversations, planning, modifications, changes, and pacing adjustments to make sure that everyone involved has a good time.